


Methods of Falling

by stutter



Series: adventures in personal growth [1]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Age Difference, M/M, Moody Teens, Pre-Slash, Some Pretty Fluffy Gestures of Affection, Very Chaste Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-15
Updated: 2016-12-15
Packaged: 2018-09-08 17:54:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8855233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stutter/pseuds/stutter
Summary: "When Victor was his age - younger, even, Yuri thinks, shame blooming in his chest - he’d made the whole world fall in love with him already. The long hair, the soft smile, the way he moved like he had a secret in his skin and he couldn't wait to share it with you. Yuri’s watched the tapes over and over. He could skate any of Victor’s early routines in his sleep. But he can't - the thing Victor could do so easily, the casual, guileless charisma he threw like a shadow - Yuri can't manage it on a single person, not even some moody Kazakh with a dumb haircut whose eyes are too far apart anyway - " (In Park Guell, Yuri takes a hard fall. Otabek picks him up.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place during the GPF in Barcelona. Assumes these two have enough downtime to spend a few quality hours alone each day.

Yuri’s good at falling. 

 

He doesn’t recoil from the pain - hasn’t since he was a kid, scrawny and weak and wishing for a gentler world. He knows how to breathe through it, leave it behind, glide away from it like it happened to someone else. He can always tell in the air whether he’s going to land right or not. If he over-rotates, if he’s sloppy or off-balance, his muscles are already a step ahead of the gravity, preparing to rocket him up, away, forward. 

 

The trick to a good fall is this: you don’t get scared, you absorb the shock, and then you get the hell back up as fast as you can and move _on_. You don’t stay down. 

 

But in the moment, with the sun coming up before them, with the rosy light glinting through Otabek’s lashes, it had made sense. It had felt like a sure thing. They'd been sneaking out early in the mornings. Yuri had never talked to someone else so much. They’d come to this same spot in the park yesterday at dawn, and the day before at sunset, so that Yuri had inanely started to think of it as _their_ place. And, then, in the moment, their easy conversation at a natural lull, he'd leaned in. Yuri doesn’t try for jumps he doesn’t think he can land. He thought he had this one. 

 

Otabek’s hands, when they wrap around Yuri’s wrists and push him back, are strong, a little rough, surprisingly broad. Yuri’s wrists look tiny in his grasp. Almost childlike. His heart clenches in his chest like an angry fist. His teeth grit instinctively like he’s about to hit the ice at the wrong angle. He can feel a pink flush creeping up his neck but he keeps his face calm. 

 

Otabek’s eyes are unreadable. He opens his mouth, shuts it again. He looks at Yuri like he’s a combination lock and he only remembers half the numbers. Yuri’s stomach roils, and he clamps down on the mad urge to apologize. 

 

“What?” he finally spits. “Why are you staring at me like that?” In his guts, he can feel a full-body shake coming on, a tremor he keeps at bay only with steady breathing and the straight razor of his will.

 

“I…” Otabek frowns, looking down at his fingers against Yuri’s pale arms. A lock of dark hair falls over his eyes. His grip loosens a little. “I’m looking for the words.” 

 

Yuri tries to be patient, although in the entire world there’s nothing he hates more. Most spills are quick: a sharp burst of pain and then it's over. This one’s taking forever. He could feel Otabek recoiling while he was still moving in towards him, but it was too late to stop, the arc of the action set in place and running its course already. He wants to get to the next stage, ready to take the hit and move on. But he’s forgotten suddenly how not to be scared, how not to be ashamed. Otabek’s brow is furrowed. Yuri gnashes his teeth. “Your Russian is better than this,” he chides. “Just spit it out already.” 

 

Otabek looks at him a little sharply, and Yuri glowers right back, even though he knows it’s unfair. Helplessness makes him pointlessly mean. When you fall, you don’t blame the ice for your bruises and aches. You don’t blame your skates. You have nobody to blame but yourself. 

 

Otabek tries again. “Yuri,” he says. “I...was there something, did I do something to make you feel you _had_ to - I think I’ve given you the wrong idea.” 

 

God. It’s worse than he could’ve thought. He wrenches back, but Otabek doesn't let him go, and it's like a magic curse, how much Yuri wanted to be touched by him just seconds ago and now it's as if he can feel blisters forming everywhere his fingers lay. “Honestly,” Yuri says flatly, “just don't.”

 

Otabek releases him at once. “Let me try and explain,” he says, but Yuri’s already propelled himself away, like he would with any other fall, to thoroughly investigate the mosaics on the other side of the footbridge. 

 

When Victor was his age - younger, even, Yuri thinks, shame blooming in his chest - he’d made the whole world fall in love with him already. The long hair, the soft smile, the way he moved like he had a secret in his skin and he couldn't wait to share it with you. Yuri’s watched the tapes over and over. He could skate any of Victor’s early routines in his sleep. But he can't - the thing Victor could do so easily, the casual, guileless charisma he threw like a shadow - Yuri can't manage it on a _single_ person, not even some moody Kazakh with a dumb haircut whose eyes are too far apart anyway - 

 

“ _Yuri_.” Otabek moves quietly, like a panther, and Yuri jumps at the sensation of his low voice on the back of his neck. He whirls to face him, despite his deep desire to jump right off this bridge into the ravine below. They're close. Breathing is a challenge. He's never been down for this long. Otabek’s face is, horrifically, a little amused. “Don't _sulk_ ,” he says. “I don't want you to misunderstand.”

 

“I get it,” Yuri snaps, and in the best possible world he'd sound bored, annoyed, but all his stupid feelings come tumbling out of his mouth with the words and how he sounds is young and fragile and sad. “You don't - want me, you don't like me, like that, there's nothing to explain.” He bites down on his lip savagely so it doesn't tremble - get it together, absorb the blow, move forward, don't be a child - “Just forget it, okay?” He looks away. Otabek’s fingers land under his chin and angle his face back up toward his own. “Please,” he hisses. He pushes hard against Otabek’s chest, but he's solid, immovable. Yuri looks off, finding the middle distance, even as he can feel dark eyes boring into his face. 

 

“That's not what it is at all,” Otabek says. “All of that's wrong.”

 

When Yuri raises his eyes to Otabek again, he's no longer smiling, but his expression is soft. He finds one of Yuri’s hands and seizes it, bringing it close to his face. Yuri’s limbs suddenly go numb. His fists uncurl. Otabek presses a kiss to his palm.

 

“I, but, you,” says Yuri, whose heart has stopped.

 

“Right.” There’s the hint of a smile in the corner of Otabek’s mouth. Thoughtless, Yuri reaches his free hand up to poke at it, timidly, and it gets a little wider. “So can you not jump down my throat, please? Just listen to what I’m trying to say.”

 

Yuri’s mind reshuffles. He finds sense enough to scowl, which feels familiar and safe. “Don't you turn this into a lecture. My whole life is lectures,” he grumbles. Otabek snorts.

 

“I wouldn't dare lecture you,” he says. He steps back and curves his body to lean beside Yuri against the bridge. As soon as he moves Yuri misses having him there; the sun’s getting higher, making him squint, and there’s a chilly breeze creeping under his coat. Otabek watches the sky. “I admire you, Yuri,” he says quietly. “I...I like you a lot. It’s because I like you that I stopped you.”

 

Yuri wrinkles his nose. He sees Otabek’s hand beside his own against the tiles and feels his muscles twitch toward it. Instead, he pushes forward off the wall, digging his hands into his pockets, and starts walking off the bridge toward the stairs. His palm tingles where Otabek kissed it. Otabek falls into step beside him. “I don’t get it,” Yuri says. “You can play mysterious with everyone else, but why do it with me? If you don’t see me...that way, you can just say it.” In the corner of his vision, he sees Otabek’s head drop down. 

 

“It’s not that simple,” Otabek says.

 

“I don’t think it’s so complex.” Yuri sidles past him, leaping up onto the curb on one foot and putting his arms out for balance. Otabek takes the stairs, watching him, and even now, his gaze feels good, warms Yuri to his fingertips. 

 

“Yuri, there is…” Yuri keeps his eyes down on his footwork, but he can picture the crease between Otabek’s eyebrows deepening as he speaks. “You're smart as hell, but there's still a lot you don't understand, okay?”

 

Yuri stops in his tracks, finding his footing on the decline. He looks down at Otabek, sneering, ugly black smoke curling in his stomach. “I'm not a child,” he snaps. “Is that what you think? That I'm too young and sweet?”

 

“I didn't say that,” Otabek says calmly, but Yuri can’t seem to stop himself. 

 

“Because maybe you have your Yuris confused,” he goes on. “This one doesn't get off on pretending to be all naive and innocent, this one can say what he thinks, all right? This one doesn't need protection.”

 

Otabek stares at him, one eyebrow climbing toward his hairline. Yuri stares back, resolute. Then Otabek snorts with laughter. Yuri, surprised, glares harder. 

 

“You're funny,” Otabek chuckles. It's a rich, dark sound, like chocolate. “Why are you so mean, huh? He's not even here. Why don't you leave him alone?”

 

“I hate that guy,” mutters Yuri, fighting a smile. 

 

“Sure you do.” Otabek turns his back to Yuri and leans forward, dipping his head. “Get on.” 

 

Yuri’s mouth falls open. His kissed hand throbs like a new heartbeat. “No!” he protests. 

 

“Come on.” All Yuri can see of Otabek’s face from this angle is one high cheekbone, pushed up in amusement, and the curl of a lip. The notion of a piggyback ride is suddenly hugely appealing, as his own legs seem to lose their strength. 

 

“Oh, for god’s sake,” he says, grinning fiercely. “Don't make me do this.” 

 

Otabek straightens slightly. “I'd never make you do anything you didn't want to,” he says seriously. Then, he waits. 

 

Yuri watches. His toes curl in his shoes. “This is humiliating,” he grumbles, wrapping his arms around Otabek’s neck. He breathes in the smell of him, leather from his jacket and whatever he puts in his soft black hair to make it fall so perfectly. Otabek takes a step forward and easily transfers Yuri’s weight onto his back. His hands find his legs, keeping him steady. Yuri presses his smile into Otabek’s shoulder. 

 

“Okay?” 

 

Yuri nods. Otabek seems satisfied. “You weigh nothing at all,” he observes. He starts down the long staircase toward the carved stone lizard at the base, whose bright blue and green tiles glow like magic in the early morning sun. Each step jostles Yuri against Otabek’s back, filling him with a delirious lightness that threatens to burst out of him in giggles. “I’ve found,” Otabek muses, “that it’s hard to be grumpy during a piggyback ride.” 

 

“I feel ridiculous,” Yuri lies. Otabek doesn’t seem too worried about it. At the bottom of the stairs, he hooks a right and then leans back to let Yuri down. Yuri wants to cling to him tighter, but shakes the desire away and regains his footing beside him. Otabek glances down at him, half-smiling, and Yuri’s stomach flips over again.

 

“This is what I’ll say,” Otabek begins, “if you’ll let me.” They’re walking close enough that their arms brush on every step. He eyes Yuri, who starts to respond and then, thinking better of it, just nods. Otabek says, “I don’t see you as a child. Not at all. When I look at you, I see - someone clever. And surprising. And tough, and strong.” A little flame of pride ignites in Yuri’s throat. “And someone who’s still growing. _That’s_ -” he says, a little louder, as Yuri opens his mouth to protest, “that’s just a fact. It’s not an insult, Yura. You’re still growing. I’m still growing, too.” 

 

There are words, dozens of them, fighting to get out of Yuri’s brain and into the air, but he bites his tongue until he’s sure Otabek is done speaking. Then he takes a breath. “Beka,” he says quietly, and this must be the hardest he’s ever worked to form a simple sentence, “just, please, do you - do you like me or not?”

 

Maybe it’s just the way the sunlight glances off all the glass fragments in the park, but Otabek’s cheeks and nose seem to suddenly take color. He stops walking. Yuri does, too, gritting his teeth so they don’t chatter with nerves. Otabek reaches down and frames Yuri’s face tenderly with his hands. He leans in and presses his lips to his forehead. Yuri can feel the heat of Otabek’s skin like an electric shock. “Yes,” Otabek says in a low voice. 

 

Yuri lays his hands flat against Otabek’s chest. If asked why he’s shaking he’ll blame the cold, even as the air gets warmer every minute. “I,” he murmurs, “I want…” 

 

“Yeah, I know.” And then it’s like before, how he takes a hold of Yuri’s wrists, pushes him gently away. And Yuri has no idea anymore - is he falling? Did he make it? The moment feels kinetic, a program already in progress. How long has he been in the air? 

 

Otabek smiles down at him, in his shadowy way. “But - Yura. What’s the rush?” 

 

Yuri frowns, but doesn’t fight. He doesn't have an answer beyond his own impatience. Otabek goes on, “I expect to know you for a long time. If that’s something you’d like.”

 

Aggravatingly, Yuri’s thoughts flash to Victor, the second-to-last person he’d like to think of at a time like this. All he can see is Victor’s moon-eyed expression, watching his stupid pork cutlet bowl back in Hasetsu (and, great, now he’s thinking of both of them, making this a true worst case scenario for his subconscious mind). He thinks of Victor, famously empty-headed and impulsive and capricious, waiting patiently for Yuuri to catch up, to remember, giving up everything for just the chance to get close enough to touch. He wonders about waiting. Wonders if anything like that could be worth waiting for. He looks up into Otabek’s calm black eyes. 

 

“I would like that,” he mumbles. 

 

Otabek’s lips quirk up. “Then be my friend, for a start, like you said you would.” He extends his right hand for Yuri to shake.

 

Always with the handshakes, this guy. Yuri suppresses a giddy laugh. He grabs the hand with his left, raising it toward his face to brush his lips across Otabek’s knuckles. His face - shocked, flushing red - makes the risk worth taking. Yuri’s chest expands like he’s landed a perfect jump, easy and natural as a deep breath. “What?” he demands. “You're the only one allowed to give weird hand kisses?”

 

“ _Weird_.” Otabek’s lips are twitching again. “You're so cruel to me.” He turns on his heel, tugging Yuri along with him by the hand. The sun’s getting higher. Yuri knows he’s got to get back before Yakov notices he's gone and blows his lungs out bellowing at him.

 

“If you can't handle it,” Yuri offers dryly, skipping to catch up to his long strides, “I can be nicer.”

 

Otabek hisses out another laugh. “No, you can't.” 

 

Maybe he's right. Yuri’s never tried to be nice. But Otabek’s looking at him like he doesn't really want him to change at all. He squeezes Yuri’s fingers once, and the pulse washes through him like seawater. Yuri wonders if he’ll keep falling forever. 

 

He glances up at Otabek and smiles to himself. Maybe so. Then that’ll give him plenty of time to perfect it.

**Author's Note:**

> feedback is eros, and eros is feedback!?


End file.
